CakePHP - How to allow unauthenticated access to specific pages

Question

I have created a CakePHP app where I have created a UsersController, which handles all about users. When I try to browse www.mydomain.com, if I am

Answer 1

Generally you can make specific actions public using the auth components allow() method.

Making pages public may require a little more work in case you'd want to make only specific pages public, since the PagesController handles all pages in a single action (display()). If that is the case, then you could utilize request->params['pass'][0] which will hold the page name, test this against a list of allowed pages, and then allow the display action using Auth::allow.

Example, in the PagesController:

public function beforeFilter()
{
    parent::beforeFilter();

    $allowedPages = array('home', 'foo', 'bar');
    if(isset($this->request->params['pass'][0]) &&
       in_array($this->request->params['pass'][0], $allowedPages))
    {
        $this->Auth->allow('display');
    }
}

This would allow the pages home, foo and bar to be viewed without being logged in.

If you'd wanted to make all pages public, then you could simply use Auth::allow without any conditions, ie:

public function beforeFilter()
{
    parent::beforeFilter();
    $this->Auth->allow('display');
}